Iran confirms Saudi delegation plan to visit Tehran

Iran has confirmed a report that a Saudi Arabian delegation will travel to Tehran, less than two years after the kingdom unilaterally ruptured its relations with the Islamic Republic.

The confirmation by Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi on Sunday came after Kuwaiti daily Al Jarida said the Saudi officials would take the trip following the Muslim festivities of Eid al-Adha, which will end on Monday.

“The Saudi delegation simply comes to visit diplomatic buildings because the buildings have been empty after the two countries broke off relations. At the same time, we will visit our buildings in Saudi Arabia,” Qassemi said.

“This is a bilateral agreement under which Iranian and Saudi delegations will travel to each other to visit their diplomatic sites in Riyadh and Tehran,” he said, explaining that a date for the Iranian delegation’s visit has not been set yet.

The kingdom broke off its ties in January 2016 in protest at demonstrations in front of its diplomatic premises in Tehran and Mashhad against its execution of leading Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr.

Iranian protesters chant slogans as they hold pictures of Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr during a demonstration against the execution of Nimr in Saudi Arabia, outside the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Tehran.

The Kuwaiti paper said the delegation was initially supposed to take the trip two months ago, but differences with Iranian officials concerning the arrangements postponed the visit.

“The visas for the Saudis have been issued long before, but for reasons that are related to them, they have not come yet, and their travel has likely been postponed until after Hajj,” Qassemi said.

According to the spokesman, the Iranian delegation got their visas through Oman two weeks ago, and Iran issued the visas for the Saudi delegation two months ago.

Ties began to deteriorate following a human crush in Mina, near the Saudi holy city of Mecca, in September 2015, which killed thousands of pilgrims, including hundreds of Iranians. The incident cast doubt on the kingdom’s efficiency in hosting the rituals.

Iran is still pressing Saudi Arabia to clarify the circumstances of the incident and a separate crane crash earlier that month in which another number of Iranian pilgrims were killed.

On Saturday, representative of Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei in Hajj and pilgrimage affairs Seyyed Ali Qazi-Askar told Iranian pilgrims in Mina that the Islamic Republic was pursuing the cases of “martyrs” in Saudi Arabia.

He “expressed hope that follow-up efforts in this regard would yield the desired outcome as soon as possible,” the official news agency IRNA reported.

Tensions between the two countries eased considerably recently during preparations for the pilgrimage this year when Iranian Hajj officials and diplomats met with Saudi officials to discuss arrangements for Iranian pilgrims.

Muslim pilgrims pray around the Ka’aba at the Grand Mosque in the holy Saudi city of Mecca, on August 29, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

More than 80,000 Iranian pilgrims are now in Saudi Arabia to perform the Hajj, the annual pilgrimage to Islam’s holiest sites, after they avoided the trip last year because Riyadh failed to provide assurances about their safety.

The return of Iranian pilgrims followed painstaking negotiations between officials from the two countries.

Last week, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that if all goes smoothly, the pilgrimage could set the stage for further talks. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif also said last month that Iran and Saudi Arabia were preparing to exchange diplomatic visits.

“The visas have been issued for both sides to make this trip,” he told a local news outlet.